


Devoted Reader

by ama



Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Getting Together, Love Confessions, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-28 19:27:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17793338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ama/pseuds/ama
Summary: "Did this bother you?" Costis asked bluntly. "What Godekker said?"





	Devoted Reader

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a three-paragraph tumblr ficlet, but alas, I am me.
> 
> Happy Valentine's Day!

“You shouldn’t read after dinner,” Kamet scolded--reluctantly, because he desperately wanted to know what Costis thought of his account and was impatient at any delay. “The lamps will smoke, and you’ll strain your eyes, and what will we do with both of us half-blind?”

“As long as two halves still make a whole,” Costis said in an absent voice. “Hush.”

They had finished their supper. It was late fall and the night came early, and they sat in the parlor with a fire in the hearth. Kamet felt as though their ordinary positions were reversed. This evening, he was the one sitting by the fire and working on their perpetual list of household chores--in this case, oiling their leather goods to protect them from the cold rains and the mud--while Costis sat at the desk, with Kamet’s account of their journey in his hands.

He had laughed, earlier, and when Kamet had asked why he had raised one hand and gone “woooo” again. A few minutes later he had smiled and Kamet thought  _he’s reached Ennikar again_. (He was making very slow process on the leather goods; he kept trying to make out Costis’s expression in the low light and guess where he was in the reading.) But Costis was frowning now. He lingered over the page for longer than usual, and then he set it down on the table and crossed his arms.

“Did this bother you?” he asked bluntly.

“What is ‘this’?” Kamet asked, although he thought he knew.

“What Godekker said. All of this...” His lips curled in distaste and he gestured at the page.

“It was not  _pleasant_  to listen to,” Kamet said. “And I think I did specify that I worried about making decisions as a free man. But other than that... Godekker was uneducated, poor, and afraid, had been for all his life, and I had insulted him. I understood his anger well enough to dismiss most of it.”

“Hm.” He lifted the paper again. “If I had known he called you a  _whimpering bootlicking dog_ , I probably wouldn’t have paid him,” he admitted.

“Better you didn’t know, then,” Kamet smiled. “Or else we might have suffered Ne Malia’s displeasure.”

Costis still looked preoccupied. He bit his lip, and then he took a breath and fluttered the paper.

“What about this--other bit?” he asked. “These--innuendos. Did those insult you?”

Ah.

“Not especially,” Kamet said slowly. “It wasn’t an unreasonable assumption to make... or, rather, it would not have been--such things had been known to occur. It was not an insult of--of character so much as naivete, and not being especially naive, I didn’t mind.”

He fumbled over his words and wasn’t sure if the resulting answer made sense. Certainly it did nothing to ease the deep frown on Costis’s face.

“I suppose he also insulted your honor,” Kamet said, attempting a joke. “Perhaps I should have defended you from the accusation of faithlessness, but at the time it didn’t occur to me. I’m sorry.”

The corner of Costis’s mouth twitched.

“That’s the only part of this he got wrong,” he mumbled to himself, and Kamet’s heart thumped out of time.

“What?”

Again, Costis set the page down and folded his arms. He swallowed thickly and a faint smile touched his face.

“I did--and do--love you very much,” he said simply.

Attolians were very expressive, Kamet reminded himself. They were more affectionate towards their friends than most Medes were, and especially more so than slaves. But then Costis continued.

“And I think you are very pretty--especially now, when you wear your hair longer and choose your own clothes--and I have eyes only for you.”

His eyes fell to his feet, which were also crossed at the ankle. Kamet stared at him in silence.

He had not recorded his reaction to that particular insult of Godekker’s. He hadn’t  _had_  a reaction. He had dismissed the implication as pure nonsense and locked away any feelings it may have evoked, refused to even consider them until... well, it was hard to pinpoint when. Perhaps as early as when he was living in the Attolian court, absent Costis, when he had first begun to write his account and found himself giving credit to the Attolian that he had denied him in Medea.

But it was true, he had not lingered over the incident when it came time to set it to the page. He had not wanted to offend Costis, or embarrass himself.

“Come here.”

Costis’s head jerked up. He stood and approached the hearth, and pushed aside a pair of boots so he could kneel before Kamet on the bench. His shoulders blocked the fire, but the faint light of the lamp fell on his face. Tentatively, Kamet rested a hand on his cheek. He had spoken without thinking, and now he did not know where to go. Costis’s cheeks were dusted with freckles and his eyes were gentle.

"I don’t know what to do,” he admitted. “Isn’t that stupid? Over the course of our little adventure I crossed the Taymets and slept in a lion’s den and outran the Namreen and may have seen gods walk the earth, and when he suggested that someone might love me enough to take me away, start a new life somewhere--I thought it was the most ridiculous idea. I couldn’t imagine it. And even now, I can’t--”

“Not stupid,” Costis said, shaking his head. He reached up and loosely wrapped his hand around Kamet’s wrist. “But don’t worry about it.”

“Don’t worry?”

“About imagining it.” He pried Kamet’s hand off his cheek, took hold of his fingers, and kissed the back of his hand. “I loved you then and have loved you since. We saved each other, and we came here together. We’ve been doing it this whole time, Kamet, without stopping to think about it.”

“I suppose that’s true,” Kamet said quietly, almost to himself. The room smelled like lamp oil and leather polish, and the flickering light gleamed against Costis’s hair.

Kamet followed Costis’s suggestion--he didn’t think at all before he launched himself at the other man, flinging his arms around his neck. Their mouths collided, but only for a brief moment. With a muted yelp of laughter, Costis lost his balance and fell down. He had the presence of mind to pull Kamet with him and they collapsed together on the hearth rug in a tangle of limbs, giggling breathlessly. Kamet pushed himself up on the heels of his hands and ducked down to kiss Costis on the lips one more time, sweetly and softly. Costis cupped his cheek.

"You’ll have to change the ending now.”

“No, I think the current ending is sufficient.” He rested his head on Costis’s chest and exhaled, a smile playing on his lips. “But perhaps I will write a sequel.”


End file.
